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Lens

Hypothetically, if everyone from every situation despite their shortcomings(like income inequality) worked really hard and received a high amount of education or learned a high amount of skills. Would there still be decent jobs for them? Would everyone get the amount of money they deserve? Would Capitalism as we know it still be able to function? Or does capitalism thrive with a class of low educated, easily fooled, materialistic, depressed, desperate, scratching to get out of debt and violent people?

Yeah because everyone would rather work for pennies. Does the right think that by taking EVERY SINGLE POSSIBLE STAND they can against the little guy they will somehow win because they have the votes of the Koch brothers? There are more of us than them. Remember Mittens' 47% comment? The truth is they want the average working guy poor and stupid. Their stranglehold on America is threatened by anything less.

If you raise the cost of labor, businesses will fire workers. Some workers will actually see their wages increase. Others will get fired. I'm curious, what ratio of wage increases versus firing is optimal to you? If ten times as many ppl are fired, rather then kept on at the higher wage, would that be worthwhile to you? Since a fraction of workers saw their wages increased, its fine if far more ppl were fired? Or are you one of those liberals who pretends that everything is free, and increasing the minimum wage won't cause any firings? By ignoring logic and reason, you can simply insult the other side and call them hateful and mean! Boo hoo.

Do you think businesses will be able to survive if the people who buy their products can't afford to buy them anymore? Economies run on demand, not supply. Only a few employees need to lose their jobs. And, they're all at the top of the business hierarchy.

February 25, 2014 at 7:26 am |

Mobious

You guys know union jobs are affected by the minimum wage right? Sooo "Skilled" workers in unions would also be required, under contract, to get a raise if the minimum wage is increased. Want a plumber? Get ready to pay out the nose...

Raise wages (expenses) here, jobs will go there. Politicians are self-centered integrity-less asses pandering to the stupid. The government is void of good selfless people working for the good of all. Have more faith in the ability of people to survive. Force people to survive, and they will. Teach people how to be content rather than greedy, and they can and will be content.

Protecting Humans from Robotics And their wage will climb automatically.

First of all if you raise the minimum wage on entrance jobs Corporate business executives will look for technology to automate that job out of existence with robotics to double the production of that job. Financing expensive Robotics becomes very easy when devices are on the tangible tax table and become a huge tax write off for many years to come. At the same time getting rid of a the huge deficit in business wages. The decision to terminating several jobs becomes very easy to maintain profitable in business. So raising the minimum wage above feasible competitive jobs levels will terminate entrance jobs.

Lets talk about what Japan did when they Subsidized all of their industry with robotics to prove a point. Because the federal government was footing the bill they also made it a law that no job in Japanese society could be automated out of existence by Robotics TO PROTECT THEIR TAX BASE. Following Henry FORD’s advice,” If we don't pay these employees enough money to buy the car he builds, sooner or later we will not be able to sell car.”, protect their tax base by protecting the employee that pays it makes the most sense. At the same time the employee buying a product they build creates a handsome sales market that is now tax deductible.

So Japan taught the world a lesson in humane treatment of the humanities by enforcing the first of its kind Star Trek Prime Directive with Robotics to protect the human race and their tax base at the same time. Pretty Good for a nation that does not follow Judeo/Christian values. Pretty Embarrassing I might add for the US not thinking of this first, seeing that Henry Ford belongs to us. In a 24 hour operation now everyone still working made more wages. Democrats fail to understand the danger of Robotic technology's is that unless something is done at a national level We The People all end up working for a robot that don't give a damn about humans.

As a designer of control systems and automation technology I can tell you beyond all doubt you are wrong. The one thing automation brings is increase in technological skills, something the non-skilled (I deserve more) refuse to grasp. Design, programming, operating, and maintaining are all a function of automation. Not only does automation increase jobs it also increases pay for knowledge, therefore betterment of life! This Hollywood myth of robots taking over is just that. One reason jobs are going overseas is government has pushed for the underachiever to maintain their status quo, hence the push for increase in minimum wage, resulting in a deficit of skilled labor.

Yeah – I wonder where Nader's 30 million Americans make minimum wage number comes from. It seems to be a distortion. I'll cite the Pew Research Study here, but I've checked a few other sources as well and they are in line with the Pew study. The 2012 study puts the number of hourly employees in the US making the federal minimum wage or less at closer to 3.5 million than 30 million (4.7% of the 75.3 million hourly employees).

Further Van Jones began to suggest that only 12% of minimum wage workers are teens/young adults. The BLS begs to differ – 24% are teenagers and 51% are below the age of 24. 78% of these workers are also white and 64% are part time workers.

I can see both sides here. I understand that raising the minimum wage feels good and we want to help people. But can you really believe that this won't impact jobs?

I spoke recently to a small business employer (restaurant) in my hometown who pays, on average around $10/hour. People start closer to minimum wage around $7.50. If minimum wage is increased to $10.10, she would be forced to hire less people and provide fewer new opportunities. She would also face pressure from her more seasoned employees to raise their wages because now the new ones make about the same and that's not fair. What's the end impact there? The CBO didn't even measure impacts like this.

When we are discouraging people from getting a job (by threatening to take away welfare, food-stamps, section-9 housing), we enslave them to a life of idleness / sloth.

So if we are going to reward people for not working and punish them if they start working (taking away benefits), we either should have a $20+ an hour minimum wage to make it worthwhile to get job ... or we need to gradually reduce the benefits for those stuck in dependency to inspire a little urgency into their job-hunt.

The highest paid employee at a company can never legally make more then 100 times the salary of the lowest paid employee.

It's an interesting thought. The top employee (CEO) makes ten million a year? Their company's minimum wage is 100,000 dollars a year. 50 dollars an hour. (pay for top employees includes stock options and other forms of compensation like use of company transportation. Income of an owner who runs the company but makes the majority or all their income from dividends would include that income as well.).

But a company with a CEO just making a million is able to go down to 5 dollars an hour.

Why would this matter? Because those running a company would have an incentive to pay their employees more... that being they could then pay themselves more.

Not sure how realistic an idea it is... but I like the throught of tying the pay of those at the top of a company to the pay of those at the bottom.

That thought sounds good,can't see that happening on it's own without the gov't stepping in to enforce it. Then you would have people angry about more gov't involved in big business-business. But let us think of ways on how to make it work and then, 'lets make it work'..smiles....again I like the idea.

so, the fact that the CEO is responsible for making billions of dollars for the corporation and, thus, its shareholders is only worth X times the lowest paid worker's salary? Seriously? Honey, move to a socialist country. You'll fit in so well.

On its merits that ideas sounds good but its been tried. The most infamous example is Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream. What you end up with is really bad management that tends to jump ship at the first opportunity or people who couldn't get hired. I'm aware that the disproportionate level of CEO pay is bad for the economy as a whole, but there are other ways to mitigate that than a pay cap. The problem is more an intrinsic issue with how corporations are structured in the US and that has a lot more to do with legal issues that have been established over time. Also the US needs to get away from a consumer driven economy because the long term effect has been for people to become too dependent on credit and a lot of people are buying "stuff" instead of needed commodities like rent or gas, so when those prices blow out of proportion they leverage personal debt. One of the main issues bankrupting people with our set up is tying health insurance to employment, and unfortunately the Affordable Care Act did nothing to alter that – in fact its really made things worse in that regard because its now being used as an excuse to limit how much an employee can earn.

If we want to get out of this glut some genius (and yes at this point I think it would take that) has to figure out how to reconfigure the economy so it once again supports start ups and independently owned businesses without bankrupting people or making them a credit risk. If you own your own business in a market and can select your own employees based on their skills the payoff ends up being related to how hard you are willing to work. If you are at the mercy of a corporate structure where the government has to step in they will use any excuse to move around cash flow and pay themselves higher amounts of money even as they lay people off and remove their benefits. Then the issue becomes one of fair banking practices where loans and collection are not assigned on racial prejudices but rather a person's record of financial responsibility. At this time with the "bailout" model we pay people who made the worst financial choices in human history and limit those caught up in the tsunami and punish retirees who let these people act as trustees of their life savings.

Oh so brilliant, NOT! For now we are a free country. When you limit what a person is allowed to make you remove that freedom. How would you apply that logic to winning a 600m lottery, or to an exceptional athlete such as Michael Jordan, or to music icons like Michael Jackson? Equality has never and will never be obtained! That doesn't mean just because someone has a lot more wealth than you that you can't have a good life. If one chooses to remain in a mediocre existence doesn't mean they deserve more.

We can't just raise the minimum wage unless we start improving the overall business environment and employment picture. Especially not to the $11, $12, or $15 per hour that some of these people are talking about.

We Have To Fix The Root Of The Problem First, which is that over the past several decades, all our leaders have been doing is screwing the American people, by stalling, spending, removing protections and allowing illegal aliens to continue to pour in and American jobs and industry to pour out, and all while collecting their American tax-payer funded pay checks, benefits and whatever else they get on the side from their various lobbyist friends.

I've been running a business where we haven't been able to our raise prices or wages for several years, because of what our leaders have allowed to happen to our country. Most small to medium size businesses are just struggling to survive.

Our real economic problems happened because, over the last 25-years, our government has allowed our country's industries to get sucked out to China, India, Mexico, etc and allowed illegal aliens and H-1B foreigners to come into our country and take away tax-paying Americans jobs and drive down prices and wages.

I run a business with 20 employees, all of whom earn well more than minimum wage, but it isn't so easy. It's hard enough to stay in business and make any profit nowadays and take care of our hard working conscientious employees. I believe that our cross-trained employees are our company's most important asset.

We have every little turn over in our company. But if I advertise one job opening (all of which are well over the minimum wage), I'd have dozens upon dozens of qualified people and some over qualified people clamoring for the job and almost all of them would be happy to come in for less than they were making, just to have a steady job. But these people and myself are just struggling to keep up with our mortgages, kids student loans, health-care coverage............etc..............

The American people need our leaders to wake up and start putting some sensible measures in place to stem the tide or this is going to continue to have a devastating effect on the United States of America and the American people.

We'd really all be better off by just cutting through the all the my team vs your team name calling nonsense and really focus on America and improving the future of the American people.

The ONLY REAL FIX for our great country is to RAISE REVENUE, by Bringing Back Businesses and Jobs to TAX-PAYING AMERICAN CITIZENS.

Unfortunately most of our politicians are a joke – Only it's not so funny, because over the past several decades, all they've been doing is screwing the American people, by stalling, spending, removing protections and allowing illegal aliens to continue to pour in and American jobs and industry to pour out, and all while collecting their American tax-payer funded pay checks, benefits and whatever else they get on the side from their various lobbyist friends.

It seems to me that over the last 2-3 decades that both parties were always able to distract and polarize voters with insignificant peripheral social issues like gay marriage and abortion, which got most voters so caught up in the BS that they'd always lose sight of the bigger picture.

We'd really all be better off by just cutting through the BS and all the my team vs your team name calling nonsense and really focus on America and improving the future of the American people.

Once they're elected, our leaders should be working together for the good of the our country and our citizens by using combinations of the best ideas from both sides versus just trying to make the other side look bad so they lose the next election. – How's that been working?

All the nonsense just allows the puppet-masters to continue to do what's best for them at the expense of the American people while we're polarized and distracted.

But, let's face it – Neither party is actually running our country – Powerful puppet-masters play both sides to make sure that they get what they want. Unfortunately what they want is not usually in the best interest of the majority of the American people. (American citizens)

Foreign Lobbyists here in the US promote sending US jobs to countries like China, where they work for slave wages, no benefits, no OSHA safety standards or no real environment regulations. It also doesn't help us compete when these company's factories are subsidized by China's communist government. Just check out the current Chinese extreme pollution issues – We all live in the same world, but not every country plays by the same rules.

The so called "Global Market Place" is not a level playing field. Companies may have made higher profits by "out sourcing", but they've been putting middle class Americans who are a good part of the world's customer base out of work.

The American people need American leaders who will start putting some sensible measures in place to stem the tide or this is going to continue to have a devastating effect on the United States of America and the American people.

Aren't there at least a handful of these powerful puppet-masters that are fellow Americans with enough of a conscience, guts and loyalty to America and their fellow Americans to start trying to turn this trend around?

If there aren't any, we're screwed.

The bottom line is that "Our Government" has to protect domestic industry and the jobs that those industries provide. If they do that, the rest will take care of itself.

Bringing manufacturing back to the US not only gives jobs to the US citizens who would be working in those manufacturing facilities, but to the people that would be working in the businesses that would spring up all around them. This should also include the safe harvesting, production and distribution of our own natural energy here in the USA, rather than paying for fuel from countries where they hate us. Let's keep that money and those jobs here in the US.

The lack of businesses and good jobs in the USA is what's really going to rob us, our children, grandchildren and great grandchildren of the potential of a prosperous or even decent future.

It's all happened because, over the last 25-years, our government has allowed our country's industries to get sucked out to China, India, Mexico, etc and allowed illegal aliens and H-1B foreigners to come into our country and take away tax-paying Americans jobs and drive down domestic prices and wages.

That's where our government leaders have to step up and put some sensible measures and incentives in place to keep jobs here in the USA or the real economy and infrastructure of the country we love will be destroyed along with the future of the American people.

Nowadays it's obviously not about being either lazy or uneducated as many try to profess, but about wages, expenses and regulations that are not even remotely close to the wages, expenses and regulations in our country.

Regardless of what the Free-Traitors keep trying to sell us, we can see what's real. The American People need to just trust their own instincts, common sense and what they've seen actually going on all around them versus all of the nonsense that the free-traitors are still trying to sell us.

The American people will need good jobs with health-care benefits in order to be able to pay for the services of those educated doctors, lawyers, college professors, etc. – It can't all be chiefs and no Indians. There is an equally important place for both of them in America.

The ONLY REAL FIX for our great country is to RAISE REVENUE, by Bringing Back Businesses and Jobs to TAX-PAYING AMERICAN CITIZENS.

The American People need Our Leaders to start remembering that they are elected by the Citizens of the United States of America to represent the interests of those citizens and the country itself.

They are NOT elected by or to represent the Global Market Place, Lobbyist or Foreign citizens!

I totally support that the minimum wage should be raised Immediately to $10.10/hour and then up to $15, and indexed each January 1 after that to adjust for inflation! I completely agree with everyone saying that anyone who works full-time should be able to make a wage above poverty and be able to enjoy a reasonable style of living–not scrounge from paycheck to paycheck! It is NOT just walmart–it is Kmart, Target, etc that lowballs workers! I also think that employers should be penalized for part-time workers–who can live on a couple of hours a week?! If people have money in their wallet, they will put it into the economy and the economy prospers!

Why wait? Set the minimum wage at $15.00, or $20.00. Do you want all workers to get an equal percentage? Cost of living for ALL on Jan. 1? I guess you want to keep the price you pay for products and services the same. Not smart! Minimum wage jobs are steppingstones to life long work. Youth use these jobs as a learning tool for future work. Adults (some ), use minimum wage as a transition between jobs. Minimum wage jobs become a problem only when considered a way of life.

As for part time work, you have options! Not getting enough hours, find another job! No jobs in your city/town, move! The point is, it is your life. Don't like your circumstances do something about it instead of complaining or waiting on the government's (taxpayer) help!

Where do you live that "youth" use those jobs as stepping stones? Increasingly minimum wage jobs are being taken up by retirees who can no longer save up enough to benefit or by immigrants who are more reliable workers. Some places you NEVER see a young person working such jobs unless its a family business. A lot of people are being forced to rely on minimum wage jobs to pay all of their bills and since they aren't financially responsible personally or are overstressed and can't access good health care end up burning out. When you're up 20 hours a day on a regular basis and constantly in fear of bankruptcy or being fired you don't spend a lot of time with your kids teaching them about a model world, nor do you ever really learn how the world works since you're always kind of in adolescent mode economically. And you can really slide into fast living just to keep up the energy needed and then you don't make the best decisions.

America was built on stable, reliable jobs that would be there tomorrow if you did what you were supposed to and paid enough for the basics. Not everyone, in fact most people, were going to get rich. But you woke up at a certain time and got things in order and the stuff you wanted came second. Now there is so much disproportion and everyone wants to catapult to notoriety and more and more the education industrial-complex (and yes, a lot of Universities are now established as professorship markets rather than employment boosters) is turning out to be a dead end Ponzi scheme that eats money faster than a doctor's office. But right now the clown's in Washington kicking this around have no idea how many companies would institute a hiring freeze if the minimum wage were raised this much. I'd say it needs to be a little lower than COLA honestly so that way companies that are healthy cover that one or two dollar difference to attract employees and the bad ones can still afford a work staff who need anything better than nothing but no one kids themself that its easy street. Maybe eventually if we start creating REAL jobs again in this country we'll even go back where adolescents are doing minimum wage jobs as a bridge like they did 30 years ago.

February 22, 2014 at 6:19 am |

southerngent

Jacobi Coriolanus

Wow! Ignorance just exploded from you! Teens go into these jobs in high school, earn extra money for their running around money and in turn learn. My own kids used these jobs to gain knowledge of the working world, and told me on many occasions how they appreciate the experience before entering college. In your world where people don't want to work for a better life, maybe! That IS the problem! Nobody said you have to get rich to have a good life. I am at the lower end of middle-class and proud of what I EARNED, and I am tired of low life's who think they deserve part of what I earned! In my immediate family I have 3 who are teachers and know they will never be rich in money but rich in life. YOU AND THIS LIBERAL BS IS THE PROBLEM!

February 22, 2014 at 6:26 pm |

Greg Kells

Not every job is a career or even a means of supporting yourself independently. Do you honestly believe a 16 year old kid flipping burgers 10 hours a week should be paid $15 an hour? Low paying unskilled jobs are necessary. If you want to earn more. The people stuck in minimum wage jobs into or beyond early adulthood are usually there due to their own poor choices, or they are using it as a stepping stone and won't be stuck there long. Even in a down economy a skilled laborer should be able to make twice minimum wage, if we raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour but don't raise the wage of skilled laborers to $30 to start, we'd be discouraging people from bettering themselves by learning a skill.

I was totally offended by Newt Gingrich's portrayal of North Dakota! Sure, in Western North Dakota the wages are huge, 6 figures plus, but that wealth has NOT come over to Eastern North Dakota. I have been out of work since May 2013 and there are no full-time, permanent jobs! Eastern North Dakota has nothing but part-time, low-paying jobs in retail, flipping burgers, dipping dilly bars, etc-if Gingrich can fine a single burger flipper or sandwich artist in Fargo who is making $15 plus an hour full time I will take him and all of you out to lunch! Except for Western North Dakota, North Dakota remains a low-wage, under-employer, right-to-work state. Not everyone can work in the oilfields and make 6 figures, plus! Get your facts straight, Newt!

When Obama came in, the GDP was at 14 trillion. Now, the GDP is at 17 trillion. That's despite being completely flat the first year in office as we were fighting out of a huge recession. Unemployment was at 7.8% when he came in.. It's at 6.6% now. We are at a pace where it's very possible we'll get below the 5% unemployment mark before Obama leaves office.

8 million jobs lost because Democrats wanted to give affordable (ever heard this word before) housing to people who couldn't afford it. 2 million jobs gained in 5 years. Millions entering the work force with no jobs to go to. A job difference equal to or greater than jobs gained, and you want to use this as an example!

February 21, 2014 at 4:44 pm |

Greg Kells

Unless you use the u6 rate, in which case unemployment has only started to drop at all in the last few months, and peaked nearly 4 points above where he inherited it. The recent decline doesn't look to be stable either according to the CBO. I'm sure you know the u3 rate you are citing is not an accurate measure of economic stability or growth, it only indicates how many people are currently utilizing the unemployment bureau resources. People whose benefits have run out and are either looking for work on their own or simply given up are not counted in the u3 rate. The u6 is nearly twice the u3 rate. The last report was from Jan of this year, it's 12.7 down from 14.2 when he took office. A decrease of 1.5 over 5 years is not exactly an accomplishment, particularly considering it only spiked to that level in the last few months of Bush's term. Through almost all of Bush's presidency it was below 10%.

February 21, 2014 at 7:42 pm |

Smitty

Rode the short bus did ya????

February 22, 2014 at 11:11 am |

Mr Reasonable

Dear George (Bush)- the democrats were handled a destroyed country by the republicans and have almost shoveled it out of the grave. Sure, it's taken 6 years, but after you republicans destroyed everything what did you expect? An overnight miracle? ALL studies show that the deficit is down, jobs are up, etc. So keep drinking the right wing kool aid Mr Bush. You're only advocating against your own best interests.
By the way Stephen Moore is an IDIOT and provably so. His only way to "win" an argument is to talk over his opponent. Nader rocks!

That's ridiculous! A minimum wage does need to be set and is set in place but a $2.85 wage increase is insane. It would be different if it was done gradually over a period of several years to keep down the after effects. This is why a standard cost of living needs to be set and mandated yearly to where everyone's wages will always be kept up. With this huge wage hike, we all are going to be paying for it in one way or another. Jobs will hire less, people will lose jobs and or hours, consumers will get slower retail, fast food, restaurant ect.. service because of less workers, workers will end up having to do the job of two people, prices will be hiked in several areas, and people will still need some form of government or state aid assistance due to the rising prices all because of the huge wage increase. Radical or no radical, the truth is the truth.

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